The Supreme Court and Public Opinion

David Savage has this story in the L.A. Times last Saturday, noting "if American public opinion is the measure, the Roberts court has made
the right call in most of its major decisions since [Justice Alito joined the court], according to a
recent study that asked respondents about cases."

The formatting of this survey makes it a little difficult to follow. The full questions are in one appendix and the answers are listed with abbreviated versions of the questions in another. Another confusing aspect is that some questions about Supreme Court cases ask for the respondent's opinion about whether the decision was correct, while others only ask for knowledge about how the Court actually did decide the case.

Here are some questions and answers of interest:

Q207. Should the government be allowed to apply the death penalty in any of the following cases?

An adult convicted of murder: 76.9 / 21.8 / 1.2

This wording provides an interesting contrast to the "standard" question, discussed many times on this blog (e.g., here). Unlike the usual question, this one does not imply that the respondent is being asked to choose a single sentence for all murderers. Lo and behold, support jumps ~10% above the standard result, from about 2/3 to about 3/4 of the population.

However, the people seem to be okay with 2 of the Court's 3 categorical exclusions:

Boumediene v. Bush got
the thumbs down. Q214: Should non-citizens suspected of terrorism and
detained in US military prisons be allowed to challenge their detentions
in the US civilian court system? 37.9 / 59.8 / 2.3

Contrast
the opinion question with the knowledge question. Q303: Did the Court
rule that detainees have a right to a hearing or do not have a right?
39.6 / 23.5 / 36.2

On Graham v. Florida: Q511e. A state should be allowed to sentence for life in prison a person under 18 years of age for armed burglary. Strongly agree: 10.9%; Agree somewhat: 24.6%; Disagree somewhat: 36.0; Strongly disagree: 23.4%; Refused: 3.1%

That
indicates a majority agreed with the result in the individual case. It
does not, however, indicate agreement with the Supreme Court majority's
categorical exclusion of all under-18s from LWOP sentences for all
nonhomicide offenses. The difference between the Roberts position and
the majority position is not measured by this question. On the
knowledge question (Q522), a majority did not know how the Court
decided.

Banning handguns is disapproved, but lesser
measures get majority approval, including banning "assault weapons and
semi-automatic weapons,"* carrying in public places, and background
checks. Individual rights under the Second Amendment (as opposed to the
militia only) are approved by 72.3%.

*That is poor phrasing.
Some people do not know what a "semi-automatic" is, and whether to ban
"assault weapons" is a different question from whether to ban
semi-automatics.